him to gorgeous. Light sparkled from his eyes and it was true pleasure she saw shining from them.
The sheepish smile he gave her was unexpected coming from a man so attractive. His blond hair curled waywardly in all directions. There was a hand print on the side of his face as though he had slept with his face propped on his hand. The neck of his shirt was open and his cravat was nowhere to be seen. Harriet marvelled at the fair hairs poking out of his shirt front and the dark skin underneath them. The view did nothing to alleviate her thirst.
“The good doctor and I were beginning to wonder if you would ever wake.”
“How long have I been…?” Her voice was rough from disuse.
He cut her off before she could form her question. “Two weeks.”
“Two weeks?!” she croaked. Two weeks? She shook her head in wonderment. How could she have slept so long?
“Are you thirsty?” He must have noticed her licking her lips. He sat himself up in the chair and leaned forward to pour water into a glass from the pitcher standing on the table next to the bed. She’d never heard a sweeter sound than that water flowing into the glass. She managed a nod before he slipped a hand under her head to help her sit up. The room swam in and out of focus. She hadn’t realised how weak she was, but it required a mammoth effort just to raise her head, even with his help.
“Ohhh.”
“Steady now, have a sip of this. It’ll make you feel better. Dr Brown said to give you as much liquid as I am able to force down your throat. With you asleep for so long, you haven’t been getting much at all.” He pressed a glass to her lips. She revelled in the cool water that slipped past her lips and unstuck her dry tongue from her mouth, before sliding down her throat. All he gave her was a small sip and tears came to her eyes as he pulled the glass away.
“More?” he asked, the smile still playing on his lips.
She nodded and the glass was once more pressed to her mouth. By the time the glass was empty she was shaking with the effort it took to drink. He gently lowered her back down onto the pillows before placing the glass on the table. Then he crouched down beside the bed. He stroked a hand across her brow, but she couldn’t feel his touch on her skin. She reached her hand up to her forehead and encountered a rough bandage.
“Do you remember anything from that night?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Not really.”
“My name is Philip Blade, Baron Eaglestone. I found you riding through Hyde Park on Saturday night…or I suppose it was early Sunday morning. You were being chased by three men. I don’t want to alarm you, but Dr Brown has instructed me to tell you everything in hopes it will jog your memory.” Philip reached for her hand and Harriet clung to it as his words rolled over her.
“They surprised you. They somehow managed to get in front of your horse when you thought they were still behind you. One of them shot your horse. I imagine some of your injuries are from the fall you took then. The rest of your injuries are courtesy of what happened next. One of the men searched you for something and then raised his pistol and pressed it against your head. You were conscious then, as I saw you moving. I yelled out as loud as I could. I couldn’t stand there and watch them murder a woman, but I didn’t have anything to defend you with either. So I yelled. Luckily, they heard me and instead of killing you, he kicked you hard in the head. I imagine your head is tender from that. When I got to you, you were not awake, but you revived a short time later and together we managed to make it here, to my home. My sister also resides here, so you needn’t worry over any damage to your reputation.”
“Thank you.” Her voice sounded rough even to her ears. She looked at the man beside her and she wondered if he had stayed by her side the entire time she had been asleep. “Thank you,” she said again although she suspected that it didn’t convey the gratitude she was feeling for the man at the moment.
“I only wish I could have protected you from those men. I will never forgive myself for not reaching you sooner. If I had, maybe I could have stopped them from harming you. I am so sorry about that. I will make sure that’ll never happen again. As long as you are with me, I swear no harm will come to you.”
“You risked your life for me. How can I ever repay you?”
Three men gathered in the back room of a house. The candles shone from the windows in the front rooms, casting welcoming light onto the street below, but here in the back, the curtains were drawn tight and the men gathered by the light of only one candle.
“You should have killed the Princess when you had the chance, Pete,” One of the men whispered. It wasn’t his house and he didn’t want to attract the attention of the servants. He was dressed, as were his companions, in his evening finery. The white of his shirt picked up the light of the candle and glowed into the darkness of the room.
Peter snorted low in his throat. “There was a witness, Charlie, if you failed to notice, so unless you want to leave dead bodies all over London, I suggest we do this my way.” He drew in on his cigar, sucking in his cheeks to fill his lungs with smoke. “Besides”, he said blowing smoke rings into the air, “we need the Princess alive, she didn’t have the papers on her and she is the only one who knows where they are.”
“She delivered them already, you think?” Charlie asked.
Harry, the third man in the group, walked away from them and started looking at the books in the small bookshelf against the far wall. Peter quirked an eyebrow at him. He hadn’t hired him for his brains, but rather for his bulging muscles. Peter didn’t even know Harry could read.
Getting Harry to come out in public, especially to events such as this with high society present, was nearly impossible. Harry was a great hulk of a man, standing head and shoulders over everyone else, and easily recognisable.
Strains of music drifted through the closed door of their hiding place, indicating they needed to wrap up their meeting and head back out to the ballroom before they were missed.
Peter turned his attention back to Charlie. “We can only assume she was unsuccessful in her delivery. For one, she would’ve returned instead of running and two, nothing has happened. You know as well as I, there will be consequences if she is successful.”
“You’re sure you searched her well enough? What about her horse, she could have stashed them in its saddle.” Charlie pulled at the tightly knotted cravat around his neck.
“Possibly, but when I returned a few hours later, the horse and tack were intact.” Peter walked to the corner of the room where the light from the candle didn’t reach, and lifted something onto his shoulder. He carried it over to the table and threw it down. “See for yourself.” The saddle lay in a mound in the centre of the table. It was clear that he had ripped all the seams apart to look for hidden objects.
“And you found nothing?”
“Only this.” He pulled a long chain from his pocket and let the pendant swing back and forth. “It may be hers, but I thought she would have something a bit more reserved.”
The other man caught the swinging object and stared at the nude silhouette of a lady on the pendant for a moment longer than necessary. A grin crossed Charlie’s face for an instant. “Our Princess won’t be going anywhere then, will
